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SUSE gives a fig about Newton

The 14th version of OpenStack – code named Newton is the upstream release on which SUSE OpenStack Cloud 7 is based. In an earlier post I explored the relation between Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion and Openstack, but didn’t really talk about the good things that are in this release. While there are enhancements and improvements across the board, there are two projects of particular interest: Manila and Magnum.

Manila is a file sharing service that provides end users with the ability to define files that can be shared across multiple virtual machines. As many enterprise applications have been using shared file servers as backend storage devices for years, it is a key component in making it easier to move traditional workloads into OpenStack. At the same time that we have been working with the upstream community on Manila, we have also been making enhancements to SUSE Enterprise Storage, which is based on the Ceph distributed storage project. SUSE OpenStack Cloud has included support for Ceph as a backend that can be used to store VM images, provide a web accessible object storage service and serve as persistent block storage for VMs. The newest release of SUSE Enterprise Storage provides support for CephFS, which is a Posix-compatible file system that runs on top of the Ceph cluster. SUSE OpenStack Cloud 7 takes advantage of this new storage capability by integrating a CephFS driver as part of Manila. The combination of Manila and CephFS means that customers now have a unified storage system capable of providing support for block, object and file access within their private cloud. SUSE is confident that this will simplify OpenStack deployment and help to lower initial and ongoing expenses.

Magnum is a new project to SUSE OpenStack Cloud and builds on recent SUSE Linux Enterprise Server support for new container technologies. SUSE began supporting the creation of Docker containers with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 SP1 and now with Service Pack 2 is also providing support for container orchestration with Kubernetes. Kubernetes (or k8s) enables the creation of machine clusters that are designed for cloud native application deployment. k8s provides a set of building blocks to deploy, maintain and scale workloads in a cloud environment. Magnum makes it easy to integrate k8s within an OpenStack cloud by automating the setup of the container infrastructure. Magnum builds on the OpenStack orchestration service (Heat) to create a set of virtual machines that k8s then uses to create the container infrastructure. Once deployed, users can use k8s to build and manage containerized workloads. A single OpenStack cloud can provide support for containers and virtual machines simultaneously – which means that customers can run traditional VM based enterprise workloads alongside new cloud native applications on the same infrastructure.

SUSE OpenStack Cloud, SUSE Enterprise Storage and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server provide features needed to enable the agile, software defined infrastructure that is required to meet organizational demands. You can learn more about SUSE OpenStack Cloud 7 in the blog from Mark Smith – Delivering the Full Value of OpenStack Cloud.